


Peppermint Honey and Loch Ness Monsters

by Angel Ascending (angel_in_ink)



Category: Game Grumps
Genre: Fluff, Gen, My love for sickfic and h/c is as bright and burning as the sun, Sick Character, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-17
Updated: 2016-10-17
Packaged: 2018-08-23 02:37:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8310637
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angel_in_ink/pseuds/Angel%20Ascending
Summary: The thing about having a cold is that it makes you feel miserable, but not quite miserable enough to justify calling out of work. Or at least, that's what Ross thought when he woke up with his nose running like a faucet and his throat feeling like someone had taken a belt sander to it.
Ross goes into work sick and immediately regrets his life choices. Thankfully Barry knows just what to do to make him feel better.





	

The thing about having a cold is that it makes you feel miserable, but not quite miserable enough to justify calling out of work. Or at least, that's what Ross thought when he woke up with his nose running like a faucet and his throat feeling like someone had taken a belt sander to it.

Holly had only reluctantly driven him to work. Any other day he might have stayed home, but of course today was the day he was supposed to record a bunch of episodes of Earthbound with Barry. If he didn't show, they'd have to reschedule and then that would throw off someone else's schedule and everything would just spiral downward and it'd be all his fault. Nothing to do but suck it up and go in. 

Ross made it a whole hour into recording before the sinus headache hit, making his whole face ache. Fuck, it even felt like his teeth were throbbing. On top of that, even though he was so congested he could barely breathe, his nose was still running. How was that even possible? And of course they were out of Kleenex, of course. There were only so many ways he could nonchalantly try to wipe his nose on his sleeve. 

Barry was happily chattering away as he played, but kept shooting Ross worried glances every time Ross replied to his banter with monosyllables. Every look made Ross feel just a little bit more wretched. Barry was having to work twice as hard to make up for him. Shit. It didn’t help that they didn’t seem to be making any progress in the game at all, dying on the same boss over and over again. This episode was only going to be mildly entertaining at best, and Ross didn’t have enough energy to try and save it with clever banter or a story or anything.

Ross didn’t hear Barry sign off, only looked up when he heard the click of the microphone turning off. Barry had put the controller down, concern all over his face. “Ross, are you okay? You sound like you’re sick or something.”

“Maybe I’m just sick of watching you get killed over and over!” The words fell out of his mouth without going past his brain first and he regretted them instantly. Barry couldn’t have looked more shocked if Ross had just slapped him. “Shit Barry, I’m sorry, I didn’t—“ and that’s when the coughing started, the kind of coughing where there’s room for nothing else and all you can hope for is that you don’t crack a rib or piss yourself before you get your breath back. It was probably only 15 seconds, but it felt like an eternity before Ross could breath again.

Barry’s hand was on his back, rubbing slow, gentle circles like Ross wasn’t a spewing volcano of germs who had just yelled at him. Ross panted, head in his hands, elbows propped on his knees, as if he could hide the fact that he was a dripping mountain of snot.

“You okay?”

Ross swallowed, both physically and metaphorically, the first five sarcastic answers that popped into his head. His throat felt like it had just received a fresh coat of acid. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice raspy. “I didn’t want to call out sick and fuck with the recording schedule, but I’m too messed up to even do my damn job. Can’t win either way.”

Barry kept rubbing Ross’s back, and that comforting touch was the best thing Ross had felt all day. He almost whimpered when it stopped. 

“I’ll be right back, okay?”

“…’kay,” Ross mumbled, still hunched over, and closed his eyes, feeling his sinuses throb. He knew he should call Holly to come get him, but he had absolutely no energy, especially when he started coughing again.

There was the sound of several things being set on the coffee table and then Barry’s weight settled back on the couch. “I could hear you coughing all the way down the hall.”

“Sorry,” Ross croaked, staring at the floor. 

“You don’t have to keep apologizing dude, you’re sick, it happens to the best of us. Now sit up and take your medicine. Oh, and here.” Barry handed Ross a packet of Kleenex. "I found these in my desk."

Ross gratefully wiped his nose and sat up. There were four boxes of various cold medicine laid out on the table next to a gently steaming mug of something he assumed was tea. He grabbed the first box that had the words ‘sinus decongestant’ on the front. “Barry? Why do you have this cold medicine on you? Do you have a problem that we should know about? I mean, we live in LA, we can get you better drugs.” Ross struggled to push the gel caps through the foil packaging. 

Barry chuckled. “No dude, I just keep them in my desk just in case. I mean, this time of year everyone’s going to cons or touring or whatever, people get sick and I like being helpful. Here, give me that.” He leaned over and popped the pills free from the foil casing.

“Thanks man.” Ross reached for the mug in front of him, only to notice something he hadn’t before. He had seen tea diffusers in many different shapes, Holly had a collection of them at home even, but this one he hadn’t seen before. The long blue neck of a loch ness monster was peeking at him over the top of his mug, and it was so cute that he had to smile, just a little. “Okay, you have to tell me where you got this. And since when have you been into tea? Like, not tea dust in a bag but actual tea?”

“I am a man with hidden depths,” Barry said solemnly as he fished Nessie out of the mug and put it on a plate so it wouldn’t drip everywhere. “That’s lemon lavender tea with peppermint honey, and I put an ice cube in there so you wouldn’t burn your mouth.”

“I’m going to start calling you Office Mom,” Ross said, not entirely teasing. Now that he thought about it, Barry was always doing little things to make everyone’s day better, even if it was just like, a pat on the back or an encouraging word at the right time. Ross washed down the pills with the tea, which was just hot enough to be soothing, and the honey coated his throat and made him feel less like coughing. “I didn’t know that honey came in flavors. This is amazing.”

“Ross, it’s 2016, everything comes in flavors now. I can’t go to the store without seeing five new flavors of Oreos. But yeah, I know a place that’s all fancy honey. Garlic honey goes great in stir fry, by the way.”

Ross kept drinking his tea. “I know you said I didn’t need to apologize but I feel super bad that I yelled at you. It was a shitty thing for me to do.”

“I accept your apology for that, just don’t keep apologizing for being sick, okay? You didn’t mess up anything. We have a buffer for a reason, and since Dan and Arin are touring this weekend we’ll have plenty of time to record some new stuff. I told Arin that you were sick and he said not to worry about anything either, if that helps, and he hopes you feel better. Dan and Suzy said the same. Brian said that if you get him sick, he’s going to come to your house late at night and stab you in the kidney. I’m pretty sure he was joking?”

Ross set down the empty mug and leaned back against the couch, closing his eyes. “Probably,” he said, yawning. Shit, maybe he should have checked to see if the medicine he had taken was the kind that made you feel better by making you pass out for six hours. “Can you call Holly for me?” He wasn’t sure if he actually said the words out loud or only dreamed it.

Ross drifted in and out of consciousness, vaguely aware that he was lying down and wrapped in something soft, probably the brown blanket that lay across the back of the Grump couch. If he listened hard, he could just hear the music from Earthbound playing, very softly, and the clicking of controller buttons. His head was pillowed on something warm. It was nice. 

Footsteps. Whispering. Gentle fingers on his face, brushing his hair back from his forehead. “Hey sleepy, ready to go home?”

“Holly?” Ross blinked groggily, his wife’s face slowly coming into view, all concern and purple hair. “Did Barry call you?”

“Yup,” Barry’s voice came from above him, making Ross realize that his head was resting on Barry’s thigh. “I was pretty sure that’s what you mumbled at me to do before you passed out. Then you kinda fell asleep on me and I didn’t want to wake you up, so I thought I’d grind on the game for a little bit, so I’ll be super strong and ready to go when you feel better.”

“Sorry I couldn’t get here sooner,” Holly said as she helped Ross off the couch. “I was in the middle of making a new costume and was elbow deep in feathers and hot glue when Barry called me.”

“That’s okay,” Ross said, blinking sleepily as he smiled at Barry, who smiled back up at him. “Barry took really good care of me.”

**Author's Note:**

> So last week I was either fighting off a cold or having super fun fall allergy times, and this fic came out of that. The Nessie tea infuser is a thing! http://bit.ly/2ep5WiV Peppermint honey is also a thing, there's a store near where I work that sells it, and I went through a whole jar and a half last year when I got sick and lost my voice.


End file.
